“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Alianza Petrolera can pretend not to have heard.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Alianza Petrolera they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Iván Vaquero was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 8.65 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
A season average of 7.31 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Alianza Petrolera know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Alianza Petrolera hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Hector Garcia and Alianza Petrolera agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Iván Vaquero was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 8.80 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Marked 8.31 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
It needed Hector Garcia to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Atletico Bucaramanga, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
2 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Iván Vaquero was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Marked 8.24 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Iván Vaquero was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 9.69 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Hector Garcia and Alianza Petrolera agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Iván Vaquero was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Millonarios? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Alianza Petrolera this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Daniel Diaz trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Hector Garcia was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Alianza Petrolera, and 2 appearances in 46 say he has earned the hearing.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Alianza Petrolera, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Alianza Petrolera would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Alianza Petrolera this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.